The Braves’ Spring Training Template: 18 Easy Steps

Oh, Spring Training. You fantastic (and mostly meaningless) experiment, how we love thee. Upon the close of the MLB season, those of us who never learned how to cope without baseball in our lives tend to sink into an inconsolable depression, and we can only be buoyed by the thought that greener pastures await us in mid-February.

Pitchers and catchers report is in the upper echelon of special phrases, like pizza for breakfast or twelve-day weekend. Even a cursory mention provides a level of joy that brings out the happy kid even the most pessimistic of us.

No matter how the team did last year, we long for the sound of a fastball popping a mitt, audio clips of idle chatter among players, and the crack of a bat. We might even find ourselves un-ironically listening to “Centerfield” by John Fogerty, and clapping along to the beginning. These sounds, even the leftover material from the lead singer of Creedence Clearwater Revival, give us comfort.

Possibly more meaningful than the sounds we seek out, maybe the most important thing is the sound we don’t hear at all - the silent sense of unification. That intangible link to our fellow fans. We may not agree on everything - or hardly anything - but we agree on the importance of baseball being present and active in our lives. This is our sport. To some people, it’s lamer than a shuffleboard tournament. But to us, it’s Heaven on Earth, if you’re into that kind of thing.

One of the most stunning pieces of the baseball engine cranking up is the sense of consistency it provides. Once Opening Day hits, for 162 of the next 185 days, baseball will exist, and most of it will be played in the evening. It re-integrates into the nightly routine. We love Spring Training because it’s a precursor to those 185 days, and provides a glimpse behind the curtain. It’s like the bonus features on a DVD. (Does anybody buy DVDs anymore?)

Spring Training has a routine all its own, but it diverges from what happens when the season officially kicks off. Truthfully, you can set your watch to the formula that Spring Training brings, and year over year, it will largely follow the same template.

1. After an entire off-season of infighting among the camps of positive and negative fans on every social media platform, a conditional truce is reached on the day pitchers and catchers report. Those who have been longing for this ever since the final out of the last season over-celebrate this moment, but even the most jaded fans understand this means real baseball is right around the corner. For six entire minutes, we can be happy together.
2. At least one player shows up to camp In The Best Shape of His Life. Beat writers, desperate for content after a largely uneventful off-season, do their best to blow this completely out of proportion.
3. The fan base celebrates a week of light stretching and calisthenics performed by the pitchers and catchers, who generally consist of the least athletic members of the team. We can essentially smell the grass through the 20-second video clips.
4. Any position player who reports to camp early is seen not only as a hero, but also as a selfless individual who just couldn’t wait to get back together with his teammates. Team chemistry starts to enter the discussion. Much like the aforementioned ITBSOHL guys, the beat writers are giddy at the fact they think they might finally have something meaningful to say, and this somehow qualifies.
5. The more jaded members of the fan base begin to question the motivations of position players who don’t show up early to camp, wondering whether their relentless selfishness has consumed them in the off season. Position player truthers stand up for them, thus terminating the truce established not even seven days ago.
6. Managers and coaches use completely inconsequential sample sizes - seriously, we’re not even to games yet - to discuss how such-and-such player is going to take a huge step forward, or put a horrible previous season behind them.
7. The first Spring Training game takes place, and when the lineup does not explicitly mirror what fans think the Opening Day lineup should be, the first riot of the year takes place. There are few survivors. Brian Snitker is metaphorically fired 121 times. Braves Facebook groups see unprecedented traffic and swim in their own vitriol.
8. Upon seeing that the Braves lost the first ST game (with the substandard lineup that is completely normal for this time of year), approximately 24,000 fans simultaneously make the joke that the season is already over and they each think it is the funniest joke ever told. They are incorrect.
9. After two hitless games, the team’s star players are ridiculed for not working out hard enough in the off season. We shall disregard the fact these players are still ramping up baseball activity and are getting pulled after the fourth inning, at which point Spring Training games become glorified Minor League games.
10. The Braves’ minor leaguers blow a lead against another team’s minor leaguers, and the team’s record falls to 1-4. Brian Snitker is re-fired by 64% of the fan base. Alex Anthopoulos becomes a public target because a prospect who was drafted before AA took over walked two in his one inning of work.
11. A mid-tier prospect gets a spot start, and performs mildly well. He is anointed as our new King. Management is flamed when this prospect, who didn’t play above High-A last season, does not inherit the full-time starting job.
12. The first round of roster cuts is made. The outrage over so-and-so being cut is tremendous, as is the outrage over a different so-and-so not being cut.
13. In the first game after cuts, a candidate for the starting rotation gets demolished in a start, and questions are raised as to why he is still with the organization at all. Trade him for prospects...because maybe other teams could be duped into thinking he doesn’t suck.
14. One of the team’s starters sustains an mild injury during pre-game workouts. He is slapped with the “brittle” tag, and, even though he returns to the mound 48 hours later with no lingering effects, he will be considered injury-prone for the rest of his career.
15. A second round of roster cuts is made, including our newly-anointed prospect King from #11. Protests mount and petitions circulate, but sufficient signatures are not obtained and the player remains in Minor League camp.
16. The team’s record falls to 6-10. This time, fire and pillaging accompany the riots. Season tickets and personalized jerseys are listed on eBay en masse.
17. During the third round of cuts, fans are STUNNED to discover that service time will, again, be manipulated for a top prospect.
18. The Opening Day roster is announced. The consensus is that literally no one who made it belongs on it, including the entire starting rotation and half of the infield.

You can follow along at home. The best part of this is that the closer we get to #18, the closer we get to real, meaningful baseball. Regardless of what happens this season, being able to obsess over our team - and watching baseball with dinner - is that much closer to being a reality.